Cameron Pledges Making UK Health Services Available 7 Days a Week by 2020

MOSCOW (Sputnik) — By 2020 the services provided under the National Health Services (NHS) system in the United Kingdom will be available seven days a week, UK Prime Minister David Cameron said Saturday.

"Illness doesn't respect working hours. Heart attacks, major accidents, babies — these things don't just come from nine to five… With a future Conservative government, we would have a truly seven-day NHS," Cameron said at Conservative party's conference in Manchester.

Cameron added that the goal is to make the NHS services available for everyone in the country seven days a week by 2020, "the first country in the world to make this happen."

Official studies, recently quoted by the UK Health Minister Jeremy Hunt, show that the patients admitted to the British hospitals on Saturdays and Sundays have an up to 16 percent higher risk of dying than those admitted on weekdays, as they are often treated by junior medical staff and have to wait longer for urgently needed tests.

Cameron's "7-day-NHS" pledge comes as a response to a Friday statement by Labour leader Ed Miliband who promised to cap profits of private health companies.

The Conservative Party, headed by Prime Minister David Cameron and the Labour party led by Ed Miliband are the two major rivals in the general elections in the United Kingdom that are scheduled for May 7, 2015.

The NHS is a crucial issue in the run-up to the election.